What are you doing?” An orphan wondering in the forest asked Liam, and Lenny took them by surprise as they were asked about their nail bombs and Molotov cocktails.
“Wow, kid, you scared us.” Liam jumped out of fear and took a few deep breaths to keep his cool and make something up to feed that orphan before their whole plan went to shit.
“We are… We are making fireworks for you guys. Your... your... what do you call her?“Lenny tried to take control of the situation.
“Mrs. Tatibian told you to come here.” The orphan seemed nine at best, pale as the moon, with blond hair and slim-like paper. If he didn’t talk, Liam and Lenny would mistake him for a corpse.
“Yeah, exactly what Mrs. T sent for us to make this day special for you, little angels of HP,” Liam went with Lenny’s story.
“Oh, that’s strange. I didn’t know the good kids could have fireworks too.“The kid’s sadness was as obvious as the red lights on the street on the darkest night. He sighed and slowly walked away from the two brothers.
“Have fun, guys. I’m going to leave now. Enjoy your special day.” Misery in the kid’s voice softens up Lenny.
“Hey, why do you get all worked up for? Aren’t you going to be there too with the rest?” Lenny said.
“What the hell, man?” Liam whispered, “The kid bought it; let him leave.” He continued.
“It’s cool, man, trust me,” Lenny whispered back.
“No, I won’t be there. Mrs. T said, ‘I belong to the basement with the rest of the bad kids’ She said, ‘I’ll become a chaos demon just like my brother’ Bad kids don’t get to eat or play; we will starve until the orphanage turns us.” The kid said it truthfully.
“Shit, and what bad thing did you do, kid, to deserve this hell?” Lenny asked.
“I got angry at Hanna and yelled at her. I told her I loved her, and she laughed, as did the other kids.”
“And they are turning you into chaos demons because of some childish love?” Lenny felt bad for the kid.
“It seems like Mrs. T is a real bitch. What’s our name, kid?” Liam asked the kid.
“Ahura,” he answered.
“Ahura, nice to meet you. I’m Liam, and he is Lenny, my little brother.“Liam pointed at Lenny and continued, “Look, I’ll tell you something, and you just have to listen so you can see the fireworks too, and don’t worry, we won’t let Mrs. T know anything, OK? I promise.”
“What do you want?”
“You show us a hidden way in because it’s supposed to be a surprise for the kids, and take that Hanna girl who you fell for and bring her here so you can watch the fireworks together, and trust me, she will love you back for the rest of her life, but don’t tell any other kid or Mrs. T.”
Liam surprised Lenny with his empathy.
Stolen novel; please report.
“That’s right, Ahura. Hanna will love to see the fireworks with you, and here, eat this and keep one for Hanna,” Lenny said, offering Ahura two chocolate bars.
“Really? You think she will love me back?” Ahura seemed all cheered up.
“Totally man,” Lenny said.
* * *
Liam and Lenny were inside the orphanage, and as they walked into the empty halls colored white, they felt cold and could sense thousands of eyes watching them.
Pulse-like sounds echoed in the orphanage through the pipelines, all leading to the basement. The two brothers came down and forth to come up with a plan that made them end up with the most number of dead demons and their separated heads.
“I think we should go to the basement, man. Persuade the bad kids to help us,” Lenny suggested.
“Dealing with demons? And not just any demons; we are talking about baby fucking chaos demons,” Liam said with extreme caution, not letting his anger make him loud.
“I know it’s crazy, but you see, one of them is harmless; they just need some attention and kindness, and they are not chaos demons yet,” Lenny said, continuing, “And let’s not forget, if we blow them up, we will be lucky to find five recognizable heads to show the church.”
Lenny was right, and Liam hated to admit it, but this was the only sensible plan; it was far more sane than his original idea to get to the playground and light all the orphans up.
“Just tell me you have more chocolate bars,” Liam said, and he sighed hopelessly.
“No, man, but I have something that may become useful, and I would say no if you said no, so don’t judge me, OK?” Lenny said it shamefully.
“What dumb idea did you come up with this time?” Liam wondered.
“So, before we come here, I thought we might find time to enjoy our experience here. You know, make it some crazy story about how we defeated a 6-foot demon with a chainsaw to brag about in the town and didn’t think we were about to blow up and murder dozens of baby demons. So, I brought cookies,” Lenny said.
“Cookies? And I assume they are not some normal chocolate chip cookies; you are talking about the cookies made with cannabis oil, right?”
Liam said with a confused expression, as if he wasn’t sure at this moment if this idea was crazy or not.
“Yep,” Lenny answered awkwardly.
“At least we have something to bargain with, but no one will ever know about this, Lenny; this is fucked up, and it’s not a cool story to tell people when we get drunk.” Even Liam was surprised that he was agreeing to this idea, but on the other hand, ‘beggars can’t be choosers’ he thought and tried to convince himself that he was doing the right thing, and demons are demons; they must die.
“Wow, OK, man. I got it,” Lenny said.
“Now, I’m going to trick the kids on the playground and lead them to the basement or near it, and you get the fucked up kids to help us kill these other fucked up ones. There is definitely enough bad blood between them; you just have to push them a little,” Liam said and nodded, then left.
Liam had to deal with Mrs. T somehow, and Lenny wished cookies would be enough to convince those demon kids.
* * *
Lenny took the long, narrow old wooden stairs to the basement at the end of the hall. From the top, it seemed the stairs would lead to endless darkness.
“Here goes nothing,” Lenny whispered to himself.
He carefully took the stairs, held tight to the metal bars screwed to the wall, and tried not to think about what would happen if he’d slipped down to the end of the stairs.
Step by step, he got down and noticed almost all the pipelines in the building would lead to the basement, and the sound of pulsing got louder and louder.
“Way down, we go,” a voice whispered to Lenny’s ears. He felt the warm breath in his ears.
“What the fuck?” Lenny lost his shit and dropped his phone, his only source of light. Now the only difference he had with a blind person was that he was aware of this heavy darkness. He blinked a few times to see if he hadn’t lost his sight.
“Oh shit… oh shit, oh shit, oh shit. I am utterly, totally fucked. Hey, fuck you, whoever the fuck you are!” Lenny shouted and desperately tried to keep the little courage he had left to continue.
A force pushed him down, and way down he went.
He rolled to the bottom of the darkness until his body landed on the wet ground. He was dizzy and, for a moment, forgot where he was.
He had blurry vision. A red light shone, and a bunch of kids, just like Ahura, were looking down at him with questioning eyes.
Lenny heard their chattering for a few seconds and blacked out.
“Liam” was the last thing he said.